Affiliate disclosure

In one sentence

Open Assay earns a commission when a researcher purchases from a supplier through a link on this site — and our rankings and test results are not affected by those commissions.

How we make money

Some of the suppliers we review operate affiliate programs. When you click a link on an Open Assay supplier page and subsequently purchase from that supplier, we receive a commission — typically 10% to 20% of the sale, depending on the supplier's program.

These commissions are how Open Assay pays for editorial work, independent testing, hosting, and operations. The alternative — paid advertising from suppliers, or supplier-funded reviews — would compromise editorial independence, so we don't do it.

What the commission does not change

• Rankings are decided first. Our supplier leaderboard ranks every supplier by objective criteria (third-party testing transparency, operational reliability, community sentiment). Affiliate partnership status is not an input to the rank.
• We publish failing test results on affiliate partners. If a supplier we link to fails our independent testing, the failure is published on their supplier page, and their overall rank is adjusted downward.
• We cover non-partners. Suppliers who do not have affiliate programs, or whom we have chosen not to partner with, are still reviewed in the leaderboard.
• Suppliers cannot buy favorable coverage. No supplier has ever been offered and no supplier has ever paid Open Assay in exchange for a better review, higher placement, or removal of unfavorable findings.

How we identify affiliate links

On any page with affiliate links, you will see:

1. A banner at the top stating that Open Assay earns commissions from links on the page.
2. An inline notice next to any "Where researchers buy" block.
3. A link in the footer back to this page.

FTC compliance

This disclosure is designed to satisfy the U.S. Federal Trade Commission's Endorsement Guides (16 CFR Part 255), which require clear and conspicuous disclosure of material connections between reviewers and the entities they review.

Questions

Concerns about our disclosure practices or specific partnerships should be sent to editorial@openassay.org.